Wanting
by The Cosmic Penguin
Summary: All parents want the best for their children, but sometimes they aren't always able to give it to them…


A/N: All right, so this is vague, unexpected, and completely off the course of what I should have been doing. Woopsies. The story is 3rd-person thought from the POV of Kirby's mother, whom I assume is deceased in this scenario. I hope this doesn't make everything confusing, but I decided not to give her a name (for the love of me, I could not think of something fitting) or a really obvious personality (again, could not decide). Though this is anime-verse, you'll see that I do not imagine Kirby or Meta Knight to be demon beasts. What can I say? That's just my opinion; I have reasons.

And yes, I know that the picture above is Kirby with a non-canon blue Kirby. But I found the screenshot endearing since it was a blue SWORD Kirby. I'll replace it if and when I can get something more fitting, or of a puffball that would fit Kirby's mother doing something fitting. I'll get there.

**Disclaimer**: I don't own Kirby~

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><p>She didn't want him to grow up this way.<p>

Every time she stared down at him, her heart twisted in regret. Here was her little child, her own flesh and blood, all alone without any family to take care of him. He was even pink like she was, but he was miscolored. Maybe if she had been around, she could have helped him. She hadn't wanted to leave him, but she had to go on the Strato Patrol for just a few hours. She didn't expect to get attacked, much less killed. Her lover had died the same way, leaving the little puffball with no parents or siblings. She hadn't told any of her family because she was waiting until their five-year family reunion to tell them. The day after she was killed would have been the day she told them...but never had.

She was so worried about the little puffball, especially when some kind strangers had taken him to a lost children's center. No parent in the history of their planet had ever left their child behind without telling somebody to take care of them—except for her. It wasn't fair that Kirby would have to grow up, thinking that his parents would come for him soon but finding that they never would. The other puffballs in the lost children's center would come and go so quickly he would never have a chance to make any friends. At this, she had shed quite a few tears. It wasn't fair to him to have no family besides the rescue volunteers; to grow up in such an environment all his life wasn't what a growing child needed to thrive.

After about a week, she noticed that her son attempted to talk to a shier puffball who always wanted to go outside or stare out the window. At first, the little blue puff seemed scared of Kirby. But eventually, he learned to trust Kirby, and soon her pink son became the first person in the children's center to befriend the sapphire puffball. He was just a little older than Kirby, perhaps by a year or two. As she listened to the two of them talk in their native language, she became interested with this 'brother' of sorts to Kirby. He'd been there for a while, according to himself and the nurses; nobody ever came to take care of him. All the other children came and went except for Kirby and his blue friend, whose name happened to be Mikaru. Occasionally Mikaru would get sad about this, and tell Kirby about how he wished that he had a family. He thought that nobody wanted him because he was different and his eyes were white instead of yellow. Kirby would comfort him; tell him that his parents really did want him, but that they couldn't make it back. Kirby swore that when his family came back that they could take Mikaru with them, and the blue puffball would be happy again. It broke her heart to know that the little puffballs' dreams would probably never come true; she hoped that he would never end up like Mikaru and think that nobody had wanted him or cared about him.

When the puffballs were about six and seven, Mikaru spent more time wandering around outside. Then he talked with Kirby about escaping. She was terrified about this; none of the volunteers noticed because they were so used to seeing Mikaru talking with Kirby. But the pink puff reluctantly agreed, saying that they had to keep checking back just in case his parents came back, though. Mikaru accepted this treaty, stating that he'd look out and listen for Kirby since his _own _parents wouldn't come back.

A few nights later, they escaped.

The volunteers were utterly distressed, and sent out multiple search parties for the two puffballs. But Mikaru had planned the route carefully, and had set out toward the space port area where they wouldn't find them. As soon as the trouble had blown over and the volunteers had given up in despair, Mikaru made the long trip back every day to find out for Kirby whether or not there had been any sign of his parents. It broke her heart when Kirby would bounce up to him in excitement every night and Mikaru would try to tell him that there wasn't, but he was sure they were still looking for him. Still, the duo was inseparable and they couldn't be hurt as long as the planet was being patrolled, so she tried to put her worry to rest.

But then Mikaru caught a cold.

She admired the little blue puffball for how he diligently flew down to the children's center every day, then came back and gathered food and water for them and then played before bedtime. Sometimes he would go to the space port for a little to watch the different ships and maps and goods. Kirby didn't mind; he'd wander around a little and sometimes find a new place to sleep for a few days. But Mikaru wasn't invincible. He wasn't meant to carry out the tasks that a parent would do; he was only about eight at the time. When he caught a cold, it meant more work to make sure that he didn't give the sickness to Kirby. He didn't appear to _ever _recover, and often went into coughing fits or fever-induced deliriums.

It was when he couldn't even muster the strength to make the trip to the space port that Kirby stepped in to take care of him. Of course, the pink puff would have no way of knowing how to care for his friend; neither of them did. But they could hear conversation from other members of their species. Conversations that said stuff about medical supplies being on board every Strato Patrol ship.

She dreaded what happened next. She knew that it couldn't end well, yet she hoped and prayed for the success of her child. Somehow the children managed to sneak on board a Strato Patrol warship, but before they even knew what hit them...

...the ship loaded up with its next patrol, and lifted off into the atmosphere of their planet. Her heart ached as she saw the terrified expression on Kirby's face, and the worry and fatigue on Mikaru's. The ship was headed directly toward the latest threat from Nightmare, and soon it became part of a violent air-combat. The demon beasts drove the ship closer and closer to the ground before most of the crew decided to take to the roof and fight hand-to-hand. Kirby, ever the brave one, scrambled up after them to help, and Mikaru followed in an attempt to stop him. On the roof, various demon beasts skilled in either physical combat or magic spells were combating her puffball kin. Kirby had managed to avoid getting hit or detected, but as Mikaru crawled out into the open, a spell-monster turned toward the blue puffball. It turned its wand from its target and instead threw the spell at him, and she felt sick as to what would happen next.

Then Kirby, ever the valiant one, leapt over and shoved him out of the way. He almost managed to avoid getting hit himself, but the spell grazed his foot, and his body flashed white before he fell unconscious and started to roll off the ship. Mikaru summoned all his strength before jumping off after him, inflating, and letting them both fall into a nearby tree before losing consciousness himself. She worried and worried, hoping that somebody would find them and take care of them.

But nobody did.

Time went by. It seemed Kirby had taken a bit of an age-decreasing spell, apparently aimed toward one of the older puffballs intentionally. Mikaru continued to take care of the now-younger-acting Kirby, despite his illness. He no longer went to the children's center, and his trips to the space port got shorter or longer depending on how long Kirby was sleeping. He took less for himself to eat so he could give it all to Kirby; that way he wouldn't have to go back out looking for more for himself. His cold turned into an ever-present bacterial infection, and as it became harder and harder for him to talk without coughing, he used his voice less and less. Eventually the sickness became so bad that he sometimes forgot things, and Kirby, who was still under the effects of the spell, had a hard time remembering things as well. Her heart twisted for the two, wishing that someone would find them.

Eventually someone did.

An old space trader out searching for the legendary heroes to end the war noticed Mikaru in the space port one day. He gave him some medicine, and then once he had fed the puff, Mikaru spilled all. There was nothing he could do for Kirby, but he offered to send them off in starships, saying that maybe sleeping it off would help Kirby recover better. A few days later, both of them were in little starships, and the two lifted off from their home planet a few days before the Strato Patrol failed. The planet of puffballs finally fell to Nightmare. All of them were gone, with no possible chances of Kirby ever coming close to having anybody outside of Mikaru to have as family again.

She watched Kirby sail through the universe in his starship, sleeping as it traveled through the beautiful starscapes. She wished she was there with him, to talk to him or even sing a lullaby to him. But all she could do was watch; watch as he slept peacefully in the midst of a war, never knowing that he was one of few people left of both his species and of star warriors.

About two years later, the alarm in his ship went off. His eyes opened for the first time in what seemed like an eternity, and his ship warped to the source of trouble. He whimpered as he uprighted himself. Then he stared out the glass.

Popstar, the brightest star in space, was right in front of him. She smiled as she saw his excited expression; his eyes sparkling and his mouth turning into a huge, innocent smile. He gave the command for his ship to land, without even acknowledging that he knew how to do such a thing.

The starship crash-landed in the middle of Dream Land's chaos with Nightmare, and Kirby rose up to become its sole defender. He still followed Mikaru's no-talking rule, despite not remembering the blue puffball exactly. It brought joy to her heart that Kirby made friends with some children there, and it made her even happier that Mikaru had made it to Dream Land as well, though she could see that he had changed a lot from his childhood days. A girl named Fumu even stepped in to become Kirby's guardian-esque figure, always making sure that she questioned the king and stood up for Kirby. In one way, she was glad of this. But she couldn't help but be jealous that this child was taking the role that _she _should have gotten to play in Kirby's life.

But then she became sad again, because here was yet another child's life being consumed with adult-like responsibilities. It didn't matter how adult-like she already tried to act; it hurt her to know that two people had already tried to step in where she had failed. But it shouldn't have mattered. Kirby was growing up and using his power, and he was helping defeat the evil as well. It was nice that he was part of a prophecy to save the galaxy. Of course she was proud of him about that.

It was just that when she realized the difficulty of the road before him and what consequences it might hold for him that she started to worry. She knew he was destined to save the universe, but there were no guarantees he—or his friends—would make it through alive.

He succeeded. He grew stronger. He defeated Nightmare, and any other threat that arose to trouble his beloved Dream Land. He made friends out of anyone he could; Mikaru seemed distant at first but eventually seemed to open back up. Even the king of Dream Land grudgingly admitted that he didn't entirely hate him. He hung out with the Waddle Dees, who also helped play the part of the family he had never had. She saw him looking at other families happily, and she could tell that he was thinking about them. Kirby had never had a family of his own; he'd had Mikaru, but no parental figure or even familial structure in the slightest. She felt bad about that. She wished she could do something for him to give him a family, or even let him know that he had _had_ a family that loved him.

But there was nothing she could do. She and her husband were dead. All she could do was hope for the best as she watched and worried over a child who would never remember having a family of his own.

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><p>In case you didn't notice, the whole point of the story was that Kirby's mother wanted things to go well for him, but they didn't match up to –<em>her<em>- definition of how things should have went. Thus, the title. And the ending sentences. I was listening to the 'Popstar' track from the anime while writing this; yay for music advertisement. This does not perfectly match up to my version of how Kirby and Meta Knight's past went, but I figure it's close. And because I know this is coming, I did not pick the name 'Mikaru' randomly. It's not from Japanese either (though I imagine it to be now). Since it's pretty irrelevant to the point, I won't bother explaining since I use it whenever I need to give Meta Knight a 'real name'. So yeah.


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